Is this serious?

[iveqy]

I would like to thank for a good writter test. I liked it, always to the vim post. Now I can't trust anything written in the test, becuase everything (almost at least) writter about vim was horrible wrong!

Column mode: Yes, excellent, use ctrl+V for marking text in visual mode.
Hex mode: Yes, use the -b switch and the set display to uhex
Searching: Just typing / (can that really be so hard?) and you will have the power of reg exp. Compete with that!
Undo: Press u
Macros and Scripting: custom vimscript
User Tools: a lot, visist vim.org
Code Folding: Very good folding, learn more with :help folding

Vim is a tool, a tool for people that needs to edit textfiles, a lot of them, and fast. If you can't handle it, it probably isn't the tool for you, but do not lie about it.

vim is best used with the keys, that's a _text editor_. When you type, you are using the keys, not the mouse. Leave the mouse out of it, also leave the arrowkeys out of it, it just eats time from your editin. With vim, there's no need for a mouse or arrowkeys.

With other features like, code completion. I would say that vim is one of the most powerful editors out there.

[jgpaiva]

Undo: Press u 

I do agree that VIM is probably (arguably) the most-featured editor around (possibly along with emacs), and i use it myself.
It is a REAL PAIN IN THE ROYAL BUTT to learn how to use it, though. The first time i ran it from a console in linux, i had to reboot the computer because i couldn't quit it.
If the review was called "best Windows text editor", it'd be very accurate, since VIM doesn't really follow the rules of windows.


BTW.. there should be a better way to have hex mode available, though. Having to close VIM isn't very handy 

[iveqy]

Oh, I forgott to change the undo thing, done now .

The binary thing is not strong in vim, but it is there. Try :help hex for more information.

[tranglos]

vim is best used with the keys, that's a _text editor_. When you type, you are using the keys, not the mouse. Leave the mouse out of it, also leave the arrowkeys out of it, it just eats time from your editin.

-iveqy (February 20, 2007, 04:39 PM)

Check out this Wikipedia entry on Vi. It shows the keyboard layout of the terminal Bill Joy used to create Vi... in 1976. The keyboard did not have arrow keys The editor is over 30 years old. All its quirks were not design virtues, they were simple necessities. See what other keys the keyboard was missing that we now take for granted.

In general, the reason you're supposed to navigate with hjkl instead of arrow keys or something more vaguely intuitive is that in those days each computer manufacturer delivered their own keyboard, whose layout and scancodes were largely incompatible with all other keyboards, and each terminal was different, so any application that was supposed to be portable or used over a remote terminal had to be restricted to the lowest common denominator of what machines of the time were capable of and would understand. Hence no "extended" keys, and even today I don't think you can use function keys or Alt combinations over telnet. Well, there is one virtue in that: you can use Vi anywhere, as long as you can telnet to a remote Unix-like shell. And Vi certainly has a powerful command set, but nothing stops programmers from implementing the same power within a modern, more usable UI framework.

Please note the review does not say Vi cannot do any of the things listed; it only says they're too hard to figure out.

According to Wikipedia, "Vi" stands for "visual". I rest my case

[tranglos]

One more thing: that keyboard layout for the original Vi is really revealing. I've always wondered why the colon was chosen for the command prefix. It's inconvenient, since you have to press Shift, it slows you down. The semicolon would be much easier/faster.

Well, if you check out the One True Vi Keyboard, typing the colon did not require Shift. So the original choice was reasonable. It just isn't reasonable anymore on a current standard PC keyboard.

[mouser]

The text editor review is getting a little old, i'll update it with your comments though.  i have to admit im not much of a vi[m] fan.  i know it's powerful but the interface is just too much for me.  at least with emacs i feel like im still on a planet inhabited by humans.  with vi i feel like i've been transported to an alien universe made for creatures who use telepathy instead of fingers.

[iveqy]

Please note the review does not say Vi cannot do any of the things listed; it only says they're too hard to figure out.
According to Wikipedia, "Vi" stands for "visual". I rest my case

-tranglos (February 20, 2007, 08:30 PM)

I do know, why vim has it's set of mappings, and that do not change what I said. You still edit faster if you do not need to move your hands.

Well, vi is visual because you can se the whole textfile, not only a row like in ed.

The text editor review is getting a little old, i'll update it with your comments though.  i have to admit im not much of a vi[m] fan.  i know it's powerful but the interface is just too much for me.  at least with emacs i feel like im still on a planet inhabited by humans.  with vi i feel like i've been transported to an alien universe made for creatures who use telepathy instead of fingers.

-mouser (February 20, 2007, 11:45 PM)

thank you. Vim is not for everybody (vim sucks before you can handle it. If you try vim for at least three months you probably like it ). Still the interface is a matter of taste. Just because vims interface is different that the standard windows interneface, doesn't mean that it is bad.

[mouser]

agreed.  it's not uncommon to find some very serious programmers who love vi(m).

[f0dder]

The hjkl/whatever is not very intuitive, but it might be a bit faster than moving your right hand to the arrow keys... an inverted-T mapping would've been a bit neater, but that can probably be configured (if you don't feel like using the arrow keys).

I have this feeling that VIM is pretty nifty, but I still can't really get my head around using it. Things like "dw" to delete a word is pretty great, but I'm so used to the (clunky, agreed) shift+ctrl+rightarrow followed by delete that it doesn't come as that much of an advantage - and I manage to have a pretty nifty WPM, so speed isn't that much of an issue.

So, on Windows, I find myself launching Notepad++ rather than VIM. It's not as clunky, either.

[iphigenie]

I have used vi for quick terminal editing for so long, quite a few of the keys and I must say I like it when text editors have the option to support the vi key bindings for things like word/line deletes, quick search, line jump etc.

Quite a few do, it'd be fun to have a list.

[Eóin]

People might like to give Cream a try for a more accessible interface to Vim.

[noksagt]

I don't know why you say any of the features in vim are hard to figure out.  In addition to the (possibly esoteric, but also logically chosen) keyboard commands, there are MENU OPTIONS for all of this stuff

• Tools->convert to hex
• Edit->Find.. (or Edit->Find and replace...)
• Edit->Undo
• Tools->Folding

How is any of that "too hard to figure out?"

Also, vim can be scripted with python (and probably other stuff) in addition to the vimscript.  And user tools only need to be dumped into the plugins directory.  Some authors even package them in installers for different operating systems!

If you don't like the modal editor, use gVim Easy (that ships with vim).  Or use cream (which is quite good for beginners to vim).

Yes, vim has other hidden secrets that are harder to figure out & those who want to truly master it may want to refer to the help system.    However, for the purposes of THIS review, the author could have just quickly flipped through the different menus.  If he couldn't do this, what other editors did he give a half-hearted, inaccurate try?

[f0dder]

The thing that's hard to figure out with VIM isn't really using it - find a "cheat sheet" and you'll be able to use it rather quickly. No, the hard thing is being *more productive* with VIM than whatever other text editor - it requires adapting to a completely new mindset, if you're used to standard windows-style text editors.

Btw, noksagt... Danish?

[noksagt]

Btw, noksagt... Danish?

-f0dder (May 28, 2007, 12:13 PM)

The word is (enough said).  I'm not.

[Tuxman]

As I just read that editor review again, I'd like to add my 2 cents:

Other editors had "macro recording" as a pro. The Vim entry says "custom vim script". Now this is not about "too hard to figure out". It uses vimscript indeed, but it can also handle macros of any complexity. Type q (without a colon), add a register for that macro (like "a"), enter a bunch of Vim commands, press q again and you can play the macro any time by @a and @@. So what?

(Just to clarify that.)

Ah, and Vim's GUI might not be that impressive. But what do you need a toolbar or even a menubar for at all?
Most people here use Ctrl+S to save something, I guess. They won't use a toolbar for it. So why do they care if Vim's toolbar and menu are ugly and too short and whatever?

 

(Mine doesn't have both of them anyway.)

Its help system was another "con". Hell, what do you expect? Screenshots?
You can even use :helpgrep. Not many other editors allow this.

Having been convinced by a lot of positive reviews (also on DC ), GVim is my default editor on Windows right now (to be honest, it has been for a couple of months now). Notepad++ (its "predecessor") is my "alternative" for some special purposes, but it is not registered with anything anymore. Vim could do everything in a better and/or more flexible way.

jm2c, as stated above.
And sorry for the bump.